A Warning of Patreon

«A strange game. The only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of chess?»
Joshua/WOPR in «Wargames»

I’m divided when it comes to asking for money for creative projects. On the one hand, artists need to get paid. You have to live of something. And good tools and materials do cost money (saying nothing about raising a family). On the other — money can negatively influence creativity. You can start to create what people pay for, not what is new and useful. But overall, I think that services like Patreon — services with which everyday people can literally become paterons and support artists they like — are very useful.

If they stay services.

Unfortunately, Patreon recently has become a moral busybody. Or rather, their «Trust and Safety Council» has. Seriously, if that isn’t an Orwellian name, what is? It’s like «democratic» in the German Democratic Republic.

Sargon of Akkad did an insightful video about his banning from Patreon:

And seriously, if I were the CEO of Patreon, I’d fire the whole «Trust and Safety Council» immediately. Then state that unless you are convicted by the country you live in for crimes directly related to what you are founded for (avoiding the problem of political refuges fleeing their home country), you can get support on Patreon.

Patreon should never have started to create a parallel justice system. It just does not have the manpower, the skill, the expertise, nor the objectivity to do so. And BTW, that’s one reason why I detest «code of conducts» for conferences (see posting here).

But if they try to judge people, they just end up alienating everyone.

As the quote in the beginning says, the only way to win this social justice game is not to play.